


four.

by meggie272



Series: broken bones [4]
Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Grief, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-03
Updated: 2013-05-03
Packaged: 2017-12-10 06:38:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/782955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meggie272/pseuds/meggie272
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post Advent Children. Tifa really, really needs Cloud to come home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	four.

**Author's Note:**

> Part 4 of the 'broken bones' series - post Advent Children bite-sized pieces of angst, focusing on Cloud, Zack and Tifa.

_i just need a little more time with you_

  
_  
_\- Aqualung, "Broken Bones"

Tifa found Cloud at the sword one hot grey afternoon. Humidity shimmered over the ground. Little puffs of dust came up around her boots, staining the edges of them orange. There was an inaudible humming in the air, a thickness that signalled storms. You could smell the sky, a pregnant belly swollen with rain.

Cloud looked up at her, his eyes brilliant and burning. "What are you doing here," he mumbled.

"I'm - Denzel was missing you. He got bullied today. Some kids roughed him up a bit. He’s okay, but - " Tifa  brushed her sticky fringe out of her eyes.

Cloud looked down, something like shame on his face, but it was hard to tell. The scarred hand that rested on the hilt of the sword tightened, his knuckles whitening.

"Come on," Tifa said softly.

He glanced up at her, then back at the sword.

Such indescribable longing written in his tired, heart-shaped face. Tifa knew something of loss - well, she knew a lot about loss. She'd lost so many people, starting with the dog that had died when she was five, and then thirteen-year-old Cloud with his awkwardly held shoulders leaving for Midgar, and then her father, and Zack, and Aerith, speared through by Sephiroth's blade. Sweet Aerith. Tifa had loved her. She missed her. She missed all of them, even her dog, especially thirteen-year-old Cloud. But Cloud…the way he longed and ached and reached for Zack, it was something else. It was an infinite, tragic want that drove Tifa into panic attacks because she couldn't take it from him, she couldn’t help him. What was even worse was the way he internalised it, shoved it inside him, carried this hot heavy ball of pain like a materia lodged in his chest. He refused to talk, he refused to cry, he refused to move on.

He was so tough, but he wasn't strong.

Tifa had to be strong for him, and it was exhausting.

"Come on," she repeated firmly.

He swallowed. "Okay." He got up, slowly, as if he was an old man, letting the callused fingertips of his hand linger for a moment on the rust and metal of the sword. And then he followed her back home.


End file.
